Bush seeks spending increases in research, surveillance

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The Justice Department's budget also includes more than $25 million in program increases--up from $93.7 million last year--for investigations involving child pornography and obscenity, particularly tracking convicted sex offenders and apprehending "online child pornographers and molesters."

For the fourth straight year, the president plans to allow the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to keep all the fees it collects, which are expected to be around $1.9 billion. The agency said Monday that it hopes to use its funds to hire 1,200 new patent examiners in the next fiscal year.

With opposition to the budget already emanating from the Democrat-controlled Congress, it's unlikely the proposal will be enacted as is.

"Today's budget from the president is just more of the same fiscal irresponsibility and misplaced priorities," U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said in a statement. "It takes our country in the wrong direction."

What remains to be seen is how the science- and technology-related provisions will hold up.

For instance, while the president requested $17.3 billion--a 3.1 percent increase over his request for the previous year--for NASA's fiscal year 2008 budget, the agency doesn't expect to get that from Congress. For 2007, Congress appropriated $400 million less than the president's requested $16.8 billion. NASA administrator Michael Griffin warned in a press conference Monday that continual NASA budget cuts may cause U.S. astronauts to be grounded for as long as five years and force cutbacks in science programs and lunar robotic explorations.

Rep. Bart Gordon (D-Tenn.), chairman of the House Science and Technology Committee, said the funding increases were helpful, but the plan overall "lacks the priorities and consistency to ensure our competitiveness now and in the long run."

CNET News.com's Candace Lombardi and Declan McCullagh contributed to this report.